Activity Trackers

Another confusingly named vivo-something emerges from Garmin. This time a rather sweet-looking VIVOACTIVE 3 which replaces the Vivoactive HR (aka Vivoactive 2) Here’s another image before I go on to saying why this release is significant for Garmin From the pictures you can see it has Quick Release straps but not those of the…

Demand for wearable gadgets in the pools around the world is increasing, a recent survey– shows in this article written by OVAO Most of the respondents are active swimmers – they train two or more times a week, and their goals are similar: they wish to stay healthy and fit, improve their technique and performance. Nearly…

You can see from the photos that this is a fitness band or activity tracker of some sort. You probably already know that there is quite a lot of choice in that area. Yet here we have another one, this time from TomTom with their first foray into this particular format of device. What is…

Lots of announcements today of new stuff from TomTom. Let’s start with the SPARK 3 / RUNNER 3. The previous version in the UK was the similarly-looking RUNNER 2 which itself followed the UK’s original RUNNER product. The RUNNER 2 was released in the US as the SPARK (Sept 2015). To cut a long story…

So here we have the last of today’s announcements from TomTom. It’s an activity tracker…with a highly useful twist. It’s a 247 highly specified activity tracker. It includes, for example, optical heart rate monitoring as well as the usual suspects; steps, calories and sleep. It also links to your smartphone for notifications and has sport…

The clever little optical sensor in TomTom’s highly successful Runner2/SPARK was developed by South African company LIFEQ – seen here on the right. Whilst we have all figured out by now that optical HR on the wrist has its limitations, TomTom’s implementation was good. Indeed, LIFEQ’s measurement solution is validated (here). All well and good. Presumably…

The Gear Fit2 features an embedded GPS and a heart rate monitor (HRM) that offer accurate and robust fitness tracking and measurement, while providing instant feedback on the user’s workout. Gear Fit2: Advanced Features for Fitness Features an ergonomic, sleek and slim design for comfortable everyday use Provides a Super AMOLED curved…

Most reviews are based on the original 2015 unit. Things have moved on with improvements to the device’s software. Let’s see how the improvements stack up approaching Summer 2016. You can find a much more detailed review (here). But first I’ll try to position the product for you so you understand where it really sits.…

Whilst some of us might like to see more competition in the sport watch/head-unit market place from Polar and Suunto the true future competition MIGHT lie elsewhere. Of course there is the Apple Watch. Essentially only one hardwear device, yet they have probably sold rather a lot of them. Once sports functionality such as GPS and…

MIO global were out in force at Wareable Tech 2016 ably supported by @action_PR and 2Pure – their UK distributor. As well as a large and well-attended stand they had a keynote presentation on PAI. More of that later. The MIO Slice + PAI was announced a while back. I was thinking that it’s been…

The Nevo Balade Parisienne is one of a few ‘stylish’ activity trackers that I will be quickly looking at this year. It is NOT a sports device. So stop reading now if that’s your thing. Such ‘stylish’ devices as the Nevo Balade mark a very significant part of the wareables market and its future. Many of the…

I updated the A360 today with the new firmware v1.128. Even though HR improvements are not listed as part of the firmware release, I hoped for the best. I hoped to shed some light on a few tests I’ve been doing over the last couple of weeks. This test was on a turbo trainer. Cooled…

I started off a couple of years ago with the intention to record ‘every heartbeat’ that I do in exercise. Not because I like collecting things but rather to get a more holistic view of the Training Load (TL) of my triathlon efforts. With a better view of my training load I could, for example,…

http://mms.businesswire.com/media/20160203005412/en/507475/4/Alta-Lineup.jpg I almost couldn’t work up the enthusiasm to write about this. At least Garmin’s recent Vivosmart HR introduced a bit of newish tech (optical HR). The Fitbit ALTA is re-dressed old tech. However it looks OK and that was my criticism of the Garmin. The ALTA has slightly better phoney-connect stuff and you can…

So humanity seems to have evolved to the point where we have YET ANOTHER day where we have to buy someone some stuff because we can’t be bothered to spend some time with them. Sigh. No doubt 2020 will see the emergence of Happy Athlete Day or Happy parkrun day or something equally as consumeristic…

We covered this a few months back. Now there is some more meat on the bone with these linked images from Tizen Café. This is another no-news really story so don’t get excited, the snappily named SM-R150 is likely to be a mid-market band or low-end triathlon device. One of the images I haven’t shown seems…

Well it looks very nice. Not quite sure what fitbit are trying to do here though. First-off it looks a bit like a thinned down version of the Garmin Epix, second it doesn’t have GPS (links to smartphone for that), third it’s not what they do. Looks much higher tech than previous offerings (more to…

A year is a clichéd long time in politics and two years is a long time in the realm of sports gadgetry. Since 2013’s Forerunner 620, Garmin have made much progress with new features and functions across their range which have now made their way into the Forerunner 630 (FR630). Some totally new stuff has also…

Don’t get excited, the snappily named SM-R150 is likely to be a mid-market band or low-end triathlon device. Source, below, Sammobile.com Samsung has released a bunch of wearable devices over the past couple of years including fitness trackers and smartwatches. The South Korean electronics giant recently released its first smartwatch – the Gear S2 – with a…